to single out
103
4.4
- phrasal verb
- /ˈsɪŋɡl aʊt/
:
señalar
- It was their skill and expertise that singled these soldiers out, not their equipment.
- single out for special attention
- single out for praise
- single out for attention
And This is why I will single out Destiny for a minute.
- And This is why I will single out Destiny for a minute.
- So no child in the school would feel singled out by having to fill this.
- Argentina shouldn't be singled out too much for its wacky rules, though.
- And they're more likely to be singled out for sexual harassment at school.
- And so why is she being singled out as the as the only one, right.
- There's just no way that you can single out one particular time as special.
- So essentially it doesn't actually single out a person in any way, shape or form.
- And so no one likes to be singled out.
- There were many different kinds of anger that were singled out and discussed, categorized, right?
- Yeah, I imagine there are places in this where I certainly wouldn't single out Canada.
- I think the key with a number of these therapies, and I don't want to single out acupuncture or chiropractic.
- So it's quite possible to be, you know, singled out regardless of of, you know, racial lines.
Examples
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Usually, they list factory jobs with other occupations and instead single out particular businessmen and professionals.
Academic text (1991) -
Teachers are not singled out because of poor performance or low student achievement.
Academic text (2013) -
Why does he continue to single out Tom over the other children, hmm?
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We're going to single out one student who wants to volunteer.
-
And This is why I will single out Destiny for a minute.
-
And I wanna single out one of our own who showed that with hard work and dedication, one teacher can make a difference.
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Before we begin, we'd like to single out two people in particular.
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COLONEL HAMILTON: You certainly deserve it; every report I receive singles you out for praise.
Fiction book (2002) -
But today, he had been singled out, given a job that most in his company would dread.
Fiction book (2002) -
The teacher decided to single out one student for their exceptional performance in class.
Synonyms
2
3.9
To keep something separate for a special use or to show it as different
Antonyms
How Much Attention
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to choose or treat one person from a group differently' is directly derivable from 'single' (one, make one) combined with 'out' (separate or bring out), since the phrasal verb expresses isolating or selecting one item from a set. This compositional pattern is common cross-linguistically and follows a transparent verb+particle logic, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents would likely infer the meaning.
Etymology
Single out comes from the simple image of taking a single person out of a group and pointing at them as the one to notice. So it means 'to choose or treat one person differently, often giving them special attention or blame'.